


torn away from you (my heart is broken)

by bittersnake



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: A Dyad Means Two and Two It Shall Be, Canon Compliant, Don't worry it gets better, F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), Force Bond Made Flesh....Kind Of, Major character death - Freeform, Mild Force Horror, Parental Abandonment Mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-14
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-14 11:53:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29418207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bittersnake/pseuds/bittersnake
Summary: The Force binds more than minds.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 8
Kudos: 34
Collections: To Find Your Kiss: The Reylo Fanfiction Anthology's Valentine's Day Exchange





	torn away from you (my heart is broken)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lakerose](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lakerose/gifts).



Ben Solo wakes with a sharp cry. His skin feels clammy and cold, blood rushing through his ears. A shock flows through his system and yet there appears to be no discernible cause. It's quiet in the temple, the only sounds the other padawans snoring in the darkness. Nothing but their warm breath in the stirring the still night air. Nothing. Just...nothing. 

He lies back on his bed, trying to calm himself using the methods Master Skywalker teaches them every morning.

In. 

Out.

In.

Out.

Slowly warmth comes back to his small frame, the rushing in his ear subsides. All is back to normal.

Except.

It feels like there's an echo in his chest. Ben would almost call it a flutter, except it, has a steady beat. Like a second heartbeat within his chest.

Ben goes to see the med droid in the morning. She hears nothing.

* * *

Rey is good. Which is why she is waiting. The sun has risen and fallen _twice_ since they've left but they said they would be back if she was good. And thus, she sits by the scrap scrubbing pits at the Outpost and waits. Sometimes she helps the old woman by the pits with scrubbing. Her hands are little and thus good for the tinier pieces the old woman says. 

Rey's glad. She wants to be good. If she's good, they'll come back. 

It's boring though. She tried to sing songs to pass the time but cranky old boss threw things at her for making a racket. It hurt a little. Now she plays a counting game in her head instead. Quietly, so she doesn't make the boss mad. 

She counts her heartbeats. It's a fun game because her heart beats a little funny. It normally goes _th-thump th-thump_ but sometimes it goes _thum-thum-thump thum-thum-thump,_ so she has to stay on her toes. It's like she has a little friend within her heart. It makes her feel less alone as she waits.

Because her parents are coming back soon. She just needs to wait.

* * *

Ben's hands hurt sometimes. It's odd. It's not the same sensation as accidentally getting seared by the practice droid during saber training. It's like shards of sharp metal dancing across his skin daily. He feels like he's going mad sometimes. It's nothing physical. His hands are smooth for the most part, and the last burn from attempting a new form from saber practice is almost fully healed. It's like there's sometimes a ghost dancing across his skin ( _and within his chest. The heartbeat never stopped. His friend says that the Force works in mysterious ways and maybe it's his grandfather trying to reach out to him. Maybe it's his way of telling him that he's not alone. The one family member who won't abandon him._ )

* * *

Rey dreams of soot, smoke, and flames. She can feel the heat upon her skin, the smoke filling her lungs. But beyond all that, she feels _fear_. A bone-deep fear that is as familiar to her as the thin white marks she scratches on the wall of her hovel. For all its familiarity, this fear feels distant though; she is a passenger observing it. This fear is not _her_ fear. It is an unannounced guest taking occasional residence within her, much like the double-tap thumping heartbeat she sometimes hears.

It's odd, feeling like you have two hearts within your chest. Rationally, Rey knows she doesn't actually have two hearts. She lucked out in finding the remains of a medic droid a few years back. After a few months of scavenging, she was able to collect enough pieces to cobble together something semi-workable. In the end, it was most likely a waste of effort and time. The only information she was able to get from the scan was:

HUMANOID OF HUMAN VARIETY

BIRTH SEX ASSIGNMENT ANALOGOUS TO FEMALE

AGE EQUIVALENT TO 14 STANDARD GALACTIC YEARS

NO NON-STANDARD PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS

She only has one heart. But even with that knowledge, she still spends her days feeling like someone was scraped out of her flesh and left only their heartbeat as a memento.

* * *

He didn't mean to take the girl. His master will be furious but Snoke has no other apprentices to fall upon so, if nothing else, Ren is not expendable. (He made sure of it. That cave is long buried and destroyed along with his shameful weaknesses.)

She's unconscious at the moment. Arms bound to her side with durasteel. There's little threat from this slip of a girl but that idiot General insisted on it when he brought her aboard. 

He notes that the girl is beginning to stir. Her eyelids are beginning to flutter slightly, dragging her back into consciousness. Her breathing begins to shift from the steady in-out of sleep to a more erratic tempo. The echo within his heart matches it. 

* * *

She's cold. The adrenaline within her veins is finally quieting but she still feels icy cold. It makes no sense. The base on Takodana is temperate. She was here barely half a day ago and reveled in the sun's gentle rays upon her skin. So different from the harsh rays on Jakku. And yet, now she's so so cold. 

Her heart is racing. Both of them. They've been racing together for the past hour. 

She still remembers snow and the sharp _thrum_ of sabers colliding together. How each beat of her _hearts_ matched the tempo of their fight. She doesn't know why. Maybe it has something to do with the Force? Perhaps Master Skywalker knows. Maybe. He's her only hope. The Resistance's only hope. 

* * *

Droplets of water are still on his gloved palm. His knowledge of the Force is advanced but this connection is beyond the realms of his knowledge. He has no power over her. And yet, the Force is connecting them for some reason. His other heart is racing. 

* * *

She can still feel the tips of his fingers against hers. The beat of his blood echoing the beat of one of her hearts.

* * *

The Force cruelly gives him a glimpse of Rey as the Resistance absconds off to places unknown. Her eyes are cold. His other heart, _her_ heart beats with a calm serenity that he wishes he could feel. Then the vision is gone. He is alone, except for the heartbeats echoing within him.

* * *

Rey can only feel her heart. She's never felt only her own heart before. It feels dull and empty without its partner. Is this how Ben felt while she was dead? That dull, lonesome _thump thump_ echoing within her chest without its companion in the symphony conducted in her veins. Without _her companion._ The man lying in her arms, who gave away the very last breath in his body for her to live. 

What did he call them? A dyad. Two beings as one. 

Ben never lied to her until now, Rey thinks sadly. There's no way to be a dyad as one.

* * *

Days on Tatooine have a cruel nostalgic similarity to life on Jakku. No, she's no longer waiting for anyone long dead to come for her. She doesn't have to scavenge and fight to carve out an existent. She lives in a space with _rooms_. She has food and water in reasonable amounts and on a regular basis. ( _even though Finn is worried that she doesn't eat enough, but she's one person. Not two like before._ ) She has...friends. People who care for her and she for them. She's not alone. 

(except at night when she wraps herself in a black sweater that is starting to lose the scent of _him._ When she tries desperately to listen to the familiar beat of her heart to soothe herself to sleep, only to remember that it's only her. Alone. Again)

The morning starts like any other. Rey gets up and checks her holo-messages. Marks which ones to reply to (Finn's gentle prodding about training and questions regarding the texts she left in his hands) and which ones to not (any of the clinging sycophants that wish to gain clout in the new government by claiming friendship with the heroic Jedi). Rey eats something, usually whatever R2 beeps aggressively over. Then she goes to....not quite work but something to keep her hands busy. To create some grounding rhythm to supplement the beating of her lonesome heart. 

Until one day an odd sensation that starts deep within her chest while she works on the _Falcon_. She ignores it. It's probably the aftereffects of some jogan fruit not quite ripe enough for consumption. But, it happens again, and again, and again. Steadily growing in strength to match hers but just slightly offbeat from hers, as if not wanting to drown out her. The spanner in her hand falls to the floor with a dull _thunk._

Rey hears heavy steps walk across the floor of the _Falcon_ until they stop somewhere behind her, the owner casting a long shadow over her. She doesn't want to hope. She can't bring herself to hope. She's already spent most of her life hoping for people to return to her. She can't do it again. She won't do it again. 

The fallen spanner beside her is dwarfed by the large hand that picks it up. She wants to say it's a familiar hand but her heart is in her throat. ( _that other heart beats soothingly within her)._

Fingers ever so lightly touch her shoulder, gently turning her to face its owner. He's pale but not as pale as he was on Exegol. The hand on her shoulder is comforting and _warm._ Rey reaches out, shaking in spite of herself, to cup his cheek. Ben wraps his hand about hers, solid and warm. So so warm. She can feel his pulse in time with the other heartbeat-- _his heartbeat_ within her. 

Rey presses her lips to his, short and fast as if he would crumple beneath her if she closed her eyes for too long. And yet, his face is still there in front of her. Warm beneath her palm. She does it again, and again, and again. Haphazardly pulling at his clothes to get closer to him. To feel his heartbeat both inside and out. Ben chuckles softly at her eagerness. She bites his lip in response and she feels him shudder as she pushes him down on the floor of the _Falcon._

Later, as the sweat cools on their bare skin. Rey rests her head on his broad chest and just listens to the heart that returned to her. 

**Author's Note:**

> Hello lakerose! I hope you enjoy your gift! I went with the force horror one in a way but probably far less angst than I expected.  
> Comments and critiques are love.


End file.
